Event Planning Kit for Schools
Ideas, tips and tools for planning to celebrate Harmony Day in your school
Contents
What is Harmony Day?
Let’s get started
Plan your celebration
Event ideas
Make it official
Make some noise—share your event online and through social media
Resources
Key messages
Questions? Get in touch!
Promote your school’s event online and through social media—check out our Online Promotion Kit for Schoolsfor tips and resources (including infographics).
What is Harmony Day?
Harmony Day is held each year on 21 March. It’s a day to celebrate our cultural diversity. It’s about inclusiveness, respect and a sense of belonging for everyone.
The message of Harmony Day is everyone belongs.
Schools have always been Harmony Day’s greatest supporters. We have created this kit to help make celebrating Harmony Day easier for you.
Since 1999, more than 70,000 events and activities have been held across the country, from the smallest childcare centres to the largest businesses.
Harmony Day coincides with the United Nations International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination.
The best way for your class or school to celebrate is to hold an event and register it on the Harmony Day website.
For a school, an event or celebration can be as simple as a lesson plan with a diversity focus or something larger like a whole of school assembly or concert. These celebrations create opportunities for all of us to think, talk about and recognise how our differences make Australia a great place to live.
Did you know?
- Over the last 70 yearsmore than seven and a half million migrants have made Australia their home.
- Nearly half of Australians were born overseas or have a parent who was.
- People from over 200 countries make up our Australian community and over 300 languages are spoken in our homes.
- Apart from English the most common languages spoken in Australia are Mandarin, Arabic, Cantonese, Vietnamese, Italian, Greek, Tagalog/Filipino, Hindi, Spanish and Punjabi.
Let’s get started
This simple checklist will help you to plan, promote and celebrate your school’s Harmony Day event and any associated activities. All the information you need to complete this checklist can be foundin this kit.
Planning your celebration☐ / Have you chosen your harmony day event?
☐ / Have you told everyone who will be involved in planning your event?
☐ / Have you developed ideas for classroom activities?
Making it official
☐ / Have you registered your celebration on the harmony day website?
Making some noise
☐ / Have you consulted the online promotion kit for schools?
☐ / Is the harmony day web badge on your website?
☐ / Are there harmony day graphics on your web pages and/or intranet?
☐ / Are staff using the harmony day email signature blocks?
☐ / Is your event being promoted through social media?
Getting some resources
☐ / Have you downloaded lesson plans, ideas and activities?
☐ / Are you using the recipes for harmony resources?
☐ / Have you looked at the other available harmony day resources?
☐ / Are you using the harmony day key messages?
Connecting with us
☐ / Have you connected with us through social media?
☐ / Have you subscribed to our mailing list?
☐ / Have you visited our website for more information and resources?
Plan your celebration
Celebrating Harmony Day can take any form you wish — big or small.
Whatever you choose to do, an event should:
- celebrate your school’s cultural diversity
- be held on or around 21 March
- be registered on the Harmony Day website.
Event ideas
Here’s some suggestions for ways you can celebrate Harmony Day in your classroom and throughout your school.
Spread the word
Ask your students to share the great things they do when they come together by using #harmonyday and completing the sentence ‘Everyone belongs at our school, because…’.There’s a special frame in our Online Promotion Kit for Schoolsfor you to download and print. Ask your students to write their message in this and share your photos with us — see the Resources page on our website for examples.
Multicultural festival
Hold a mini-festival. Staff and students can bring food, put on a cultural performance or dance (if they’re brave) and share interesting facts about their own cultural backgrounds. If there is a local cultural dance troop you might like to invite them to perform.
Cultural champions
Ask students to develop and present a short biography of someone from a diverse cultural background who has contributed to Australian life and society, or who embodies the ideas of inclusiveness, respect and a sense of belonging. This could be anyone from an artist to a politician, a sports star or an actor. Students can present their biographies in a range of forms, from PowerPoints and oral presentations to posters and short videos.
Make your own promotional materials
Encourage students to use the Key Messages below to come up with a promotional plan for your Harmony Day event and/or activities. Ask students to reflect these key messages with visual images to make posters for display around your school, or even content for your website. Make sure you show us your materials by sending them to
Harmony Day photography competition
Challenge your students to capture images around your school which they feel represent the idea of diversity, or which capture key moments of your Harmony Day preparations and celebrations. Share these on social media using #harmonyday and make sure to send us your favourite images at
Musical celebration
Ask students to find examples of traditional and contemporary music from around the world and present them to the class. Students may also be interested in finding examples of musical influences and instruments from different cultures in some of their favourite music.
Cultural dress
Encourage your class to wear their traditional cultural dress for Harmony Day. Children who do not have a cultural dress or want another option can wear orange. Encourage parents to get involved and, with their child, speak to the class about their cultural background (e.g. the meaning behind the cultural dress, foods, greetings or sayings in other languages).
Focus on a country
Pick a country and encourage play-based learning by trying to learn a game, song and/or greeting from that country. Print pictures of the country’s terrain, cultural dress and foods and discuss these with the class.
Decorate your classroom
Dress your classroom up in orange for the month of March. We have some great online resources that will work well with the promotional products you will receive when you register your event on the website. Another great idea is to use a large world map and mark on the map countries that are represented in your classroom.
Grandparents in Harmony
You might like to invite student’s grandparents to visit your class and share their migration stories or family histories. Students could also be asked to write a piece about their families’ history.
Throw to the kids
Ask the class to break into small groups and brainstorm how their class or school can celebrate Harmony Day. Older primary school students could also be in charge of providing regular updates to the school newsletter.
Assembly
Hold a Harmony Assembly with your whole school. Recognise any students who have worked hard to be inclusive and live the ‘everyone belongs’ message every day. Check out the Resources section of this kit for a link to certificates.
Art show
Invite local diverse artists (this can include painting, pottery, beading, etc.) to create artworks with children using techniques and styles from their background. Hold an art show one evening for families to get involved.
Creative competition
Hold a competition with your class or school where children develop creative works based on their understanding of why Harmony Day is important and what it means. Encourage students to explore the concepts of Harmony Dayand diversity through a poem, short story or artwork. The Resources section of this kit has a link to certificates that could be awarded to the winners.
School scavenger hunt
Set up a Harmony Day scavenger hunt in your school by identifying 10 items and places that represent multicultural Australia. Provide a map to your students and ask them to find items and places that represent something multicultural.
Make it official
Register your celebration on the Harmony Day website. It’s easy and you will receive free promotional products to help decorate your classroom and school e.g. balloons, posters, flags, ribbons, bookmarks, etc.
Our products run out fast, so register as soon as possible to avoid disappointment.
Make some noise
Using social media and online channels is a simple way to let your school community know about your Harmony Day event and how they may be able to get involved and support your students.
We’ve taken the guesswork out and created anOnline Promotion Kit for Schools.In the kit you’ll find some tips and resources such as:
Aweb badgeyou can use on your website to highlight your celebration of Harmony Day
Harmony Day graphics for your web pages and/or intranet
Email signature blocksfor school staff to use
Social media tips and graphics for promoting your event.
Resources
We have developed a range of resources to help you celebrate Harmony Day. From videos and lesson plans to eBooks and certificates, check out the below when planning your Harmony Day activity.
Lesson plans, ideas and activities
- We have developed some online lesson plans, ideas and activities aimed at early childhood, primary and lower secondary schools. These resources are aligned to the Australian Curriculum.
Recipes for Harmony
- Recipes for Harmony brings the world to children, introducing them to amazing people, cultures and foods in an interactive and educational way.
- The online resource features recipes, cultural profiles and personal stories from every-day and high profile Australians such as AFL player BacharHouli and Masterchef contestant Alice Zaslavsky.
- A helpful teacher’s resource provides example lesson plans, work sheets, ice breaker and other classroom activities.
Videos
- Over the years we have developed some short videos to help raise awareness of Harmony Day and the benefits of cultural diversity. You might like to share one or more of these videos with your class to help increase their understanding and reinforce their learning.
Do-it-yourself Harmony Day products for kids
- The DIY Harmony Day products are great for early childhood and early primary school children. They are simple art and craft activities to help your class get excited about celebrating Harmony Day. For more products to help you decorate your classroom or school, register your event and receive balloons, posters, flags, bookmarks and more.
Certificates
- Certificates are a great way to recognise students who embrace newcomers and live the message of ‘everyone belongs’ every day. We’ve developed a fillable certificate that you might like to use and present students with at an assembly.
Infographics, web graphics and shareables
- We have developed some images to share on your website or on social media. For more information on these resources and how to use them, see our Online Promotion Kit for Schools.
Key messages
- Join us on 21 March and celebrate Australia’s cultural diversity this Harmony Day.
- Harmony Day is about inclusiveness, respect and a sense of belonging for everyone.
- Our diversity helps makes Australia a great place to live.
- We enjoy different cultures, foods, ideas, minds, music and art that come from all over the world.
- Each year the message of Harmony Day is ‘everyone belongs’. Share your celebrations on social media and help promote this important messagethrough your networks using #harmonyday.
- Share the great things you do when you come together by using #harmonyday and completing the sentence ‘Everyone belongs at our school, because…’
- Visit harmony.gov.au for more information.
Questions? Get in touch!
Questions about Harmony Day?
Email us at
Don’t forget to visit us at harmony.gov.au
Connect with us!
facebook.com/harmonydayAUS
twitter.com/harmonyday_AU or @harmonyday_au
Instagram @harmonyday_au
Subscribe to our mailing list for regular updates.